Minnesota Center for Canon Expansion and Change (CCEC), Summer Program

Description
In Summer 2022, the Minnesota Center for Canon Expansion and Change (CCEC) will hold its inaugural Summer Program. Participants will take part in a week-long collaborative workshop, in which they learn about figures in an expanded canon of early modern philosophy (such as Anton Wilhelm Amo, Margaret Cavendish, and Anne Conway) and cutting-edge research on them; discuss inclusive, student-centered, and equitable pedagogy; and collaboratively craft their own (collective) early modern course syllabus. After the workshop, participants and guides will meet regularly and continue to communicate as their courses (and future versions of it) are implemented. Participants will also receive an award from CCEC attesting to their experience with canon expansion and inclusive teaching.

The workshop guides are the co-founders of the Center for Canon Expansion and Change (CCEC) as well as outside experts.

Co-Founders:
Jessica Gordon-Roth, Associate Professor of Philosophy and Setterberg Fellow, UMN
Dwight Lewis, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, UMN
Bennett McNulty, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, UMN

Guest Early Modern expert:
Julie Walsh, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Wellesley College

Guest Pedagogy experts: TBD

About
CCEC was founded in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities in 2021 with the goal of effecting meaningful change in the way that philosophy is done, understood, organized, and – especially – taught. In particular, CCEC focuses on supporting instructors who want to teach neglected figures or a new canon of early modern philosophy, but otherwise lack the resources to do so. CCEC aims to teach instructors how to create a safe and vibrant learning environment that speaks to a multitude of perspectives and allows students to learn about philosophers with voices like their own. The idea behind this is that we tend to teach as we have been taught, and this is the way (at least in part) the canon is maintained or upheld. This also means that this is where we can best effect change: if instructors are taught to think of the canon in a more broad and inclusive way, their students will too. Moreover, it’s only through changing the canon and understanding the way in which our respective positionalities affect learning in the classroom that we can be in a better position to change the face of philosophy. 

Sponsored by University of Minnesota Department of Philosophy (Setterberg and Chair funds) and the Interdisciplinary Collaborative Workshop: Public Scholarship and Teaching, with additional funding pending.